A Long Way Home
by illuminata79
Summary: After several stories from Evelyn's POV I wanted to give Mick a voice, too. This is his story of the war and its aftermath.
1. Something to believe in

Having written several stories based on "In a Savage Land" from Evelyn's point of view, I felt the need to let Mick speak for himself now. Rated T because of the subject matter of war and its consequences and divided into five short chapters.

Again, I couldn't resist to choose some soundtrack music, and again this is a bit anachronistic, but I'm not much into 40s and 50s music and I selected the songs mainly for their lyrics.

This chapter's title derives from a song by Mike & The Mechanics:

_Then a woman screams  
>and a baby cries<br>and someone's dream is shattered  
>When the nightmares dance<br>before your eyes  
>they can leave you bruised and battered<em>

_Then I realise  
>that I'm by your side<br>and I'm listening to you breathing  
>and in this room<br>with the silver moon  
>you're something to believe in<em>

* * *

><p>I'm in the longboat with some of the natives, on our way to work. The boat is gliding through turquoise waters glittering in the sun, and I'm looking out for the triangular rock that marks a particularly promising spot for finding the finest pearls.<p>

"There!" I say, pointing. We slow down, and I rise, pull off my shirt and get ready to dive, taking a deep breath and setting one foot on the edge of the boat.

Something slams into my leg and sends me crashing into the water with a splash. The boat rocks madly and I can hear the panicked screams of my companions.

For a moment I can't move. I feel no pain but there is blood in the water. A lot of it. The water is thick and brownish, and I realize that I'm not in the ocean but in a muddy hole in what seems to be a tropical forest.

I try to shift and manage to get up. I'm amazed to find that I can walk, although there is blood all over my khaki shorts and shirt. Funny, I thought I had taken that off before. And I'm even wearing shoes, light brown loafers, now soggy with mud.

I hear some muffled moaning, turn around and stifle a horrified cry. Two soldiers in full combat gear lie sprawled among the mud and dirt and ripped-up tree roots. One of them has nothing but a gory mess where his chest should be and appears to be dead. The other one clutches his stomach, and blood is streaming down his face from a wound on his temple. "Help ... me …", he groans.

I don't want to help. I just want to get away from here.

"Carpenter … is that you?" he rasps insistently, wiping at his eyes with a bloodied hand.

Oh God. It's Joe. Little Joe from Arkansas, our youngest, a funny and witty farmer's son of nineteen who saw me as a kind of adopted older brother. Hasn't he died when the bombs fell on the island? Or was that someone else? I'm shocked to find that I can't remember.

"Please … bring me home …", he pleads.

I pick him up, surprised to find how weightless he seems to be, and drape his limp body over my shoulder. The staccato of machine-gun fire rings out somewhere among the trees. I break into a run, not a second too early, as a bullet whizzes past us, missing us by inches.

Suddenly I'm back in my house, alone. I don't know what happened to Joe. I want to rest, but I need to get rid of those bloodstained clothes first and see if I have been injured or not. I have just taken off my shoes when a shot shatters the window. I duck on reflex, head for the door, fling it open. Someone is behind me. I don't turn around. I know if I can make it out of the house I'll be safe.

I barge outside, try to vault the porch as I can hear my pursuer coming closer, but my foot catches on the railing and I go flying.

The jolt jerks me awake.

My heart is racing and I've got a vague confused feeling that something is very wrong, something terrible has happened, but I can't put a finger on it yet. I only know that it has something to do with one of my legs. I'm tempted to touch them both but am afraid of what I might discover.

I don't know where I am … I feel a crisp linen pillowcase against my cheek, I imagine it is white. Am I in hospital? What is it that lies so heavy on my arm? Is something the matter with that too?

Strange that I still don't feel any pain whatsoever.

I open my eyes, still disoriented, looking around frantically.

When my eyes have accommodated to the pale moonlight that picks out some outlines within the room – the wicker chair in the corner, the wardrobe, the dark rectangle of a picture on the wall – I keep wondering about my whereabouts for an instant. Surely this kind of furniture wouldn't be found in a hospital. And it wouldn't be so quiet there either.

It is with great relief that I eventually realize I'm at home. At home with Evelyn. It is her that's weighing on my arm, fast asleep. I'm surprised that the fierce twitch that shook me out of my confused dream hasn't woken her up.

I run a hand over my face and suppress a groan. Those dreams keep haunting me. Not as often as they used to, but they still return again and again, sending me back to times and places I want to forget, making me relive events that I wish I could lock away forever. But it's difficult to forget when all it takes to be reminded of the time when I was a soldier is a look into the mirror.

Evelyn has sometimes tried to make me talk about the war, she thought it would bring me closure, but I don't see why I should burden her with the senseless killing and dying I've witnessed, mostly boys like Joe, barely out of their teens, who had gone to war like kids in search of exciting adventure or out of some sense of patriot duty they were too young to really understand. Talking about it would only mean reopening old wounds that have healed, at least on the surface. Plus, you can't make somebody grasp the extent of battlefield horrors if they haven't been there themselves.

These experiences and the recurring flashbacks are something that I must bear alone. Something I can't – and don't want to – trouble anyone else with, especially not her.

After all I have managed, mostly thanks to this delicate-looking woman with the fiery hair and a character to match, to return to a life that is almost normal. I don't know how I would have ended up without her. Accepted the offer of a desk job with the military I'd had at the time, probably, for want of a better alternative, although the mere idea gave me the creeps. Gone back to a country that meant nothing to me. I'm not even sure if I'd still be alive by now. Chances are that I would have killed myself. Slowly. No drama, no hanging or drowning or throwing myself off a highway bridge, just smoking and drinking too much until my weakened body gave in to my mind's weariness for good.

She literally saved me when she doggedly kept trying to persuade me to move in with her. She wouldn't hear of the scandal it might cause in the neighbourhood if she lived with a man not her husband. (Not that I cared about silly conventions like that in the least, but I didn't want to put her academic career at risk. We were back in the so-called "civilised world" after all.) Nor did she seem to mind that I had neither the brains nor the money that her husband had had. I hadn't particularly liked that arrogant professor type, and he had looked down on me with that contemptuous attitude of his, but he had been much more of a match for her in matters of intellect and education. Would she not miss that in the long run?

I finally agreed to give it a try because the prospect of leaving her again became even more unbearable than the embarrassment of living at her expense until I found some way to earn my own living once more.

We have been together for seven years now. We've had our fair share of fights and conflicts, her hot temper against my cynicism and bitterness, but even in times of strife she never made me feel less than equal. For the first time in my life I feel totally at ease with another person because she takes me as I am – even though this is quite different from what I used to be.

I've always been the odd one out somehow. Solitary, independent, a bit peculiar maybe. It always felt like nobody really understood me, so I learned to get by on my own without needing anyone else. That dainty little person who is sleeping soundly by my side has changed all that. I'm still most comfortable if I don't need to let on too much about myself, and I need some time alone every now and then, but I couldn't possibly imagine life without Evelyn any more. She's so wonderfully different from many other women. No flirting, no sulking, no games. A free thinker never afraid to speak her mind.

I reach for the alarm clock on my bedside table and squint at the faintly glowing hands. Three a.m. I know from experience that it's no use trying to go back to sleep after one of those dreams, but I don't want to get up either because I don't want to wake her. So I'm lying on my back, listening to her regular breathing, and my mind starts to wander into the past as it often does in night hours like these.


	2. Wartime

The senselessness of war is something that keeps saddening me more and more the older I get. Mick quickly begins to question his decision to join the forces in this chapter.

"War" by Edwin Starr (also famously performed by Bruce Springsteen) sums up my (and maybe Mick's) feelings quite well.

_War_  
><em>What is it good for<em>  
><em>Absolutely nothing<em>  
><em>Say it again<em>  
><em>War<em>  
><em>What is it good for<em>  
><em>Absolutely nothing<em>

_War has shattered many young men's dreams_  
><em>Made them disabled bitter and meanLife is too precious to be fighting wars<em>  
><em>each day<em>  
><em>War can't give life it can only take it away<em>

_War_  
><em>It's nothing but a heartbreaker<em>  
><em>War<em>  
><em>Friend only to the undertaker<em>  
><em>Peace love and understanding<em>  
><em>There must be some place for these things today<em>  
><em>They say we must fight to keep our freedom<em>  
><em>But Lord there's gotta be a better way<em>  
><em>That's better than<em>  
><em>War<em>

This chapter is dedicated to my grandfathers - the one who died in the war when he was about the same age as Mick in this story and the one who came back alive and whole but never wanted to speak of the war.

* * *

><p>After I had made her leave the island for her own safety, I managed to keep her pearl with me wherever I went. It's something of a miracle that I didn't lose it at some point in the war. I wanted her to have her winnings, even if I wasn't sure where she was now. When this goddamn war was finally over, I'd go and find her to redeem our bet. Until then I would carry it along as a perfect little souvenir of the time we had shared.<p>

Sometimes there was the nagging thought that she would have found another man. I didn't know where she lived, and as I was no longer on the island, she had little chance of finding out where I was. Perhaps she had forgotten about me quickly, closed that chapter of her life and moved on, back into her own academic world, the social environment she was used to. Clever and beautiful as she was, she should have had the pick of all the promising young researchers and scholars around. Why forsake the prospect of a bright future with one of her peers for a pearl trader turned soldier she might never see again?

Nevertheless I vowed to honour my bet some day, somehow. She deserved her Teardrop from the Moon for all she had been through, and for surprising me with her strength and tenacity, her courage … and her love. Even if it might not last or I might not find her again, she had made me feel loved sincerely and unconditionally for some time. I loved her still and always would. No other woman would ever be able to replace her if I didn't find her.

But the war dragged on and on. I stopped trying to keep track of the battles we fought, simply tried to survive somehow. Tried not to go crazy in there. It had been an idiot decision to join the forces. I wasn't made to be a soldier. I had never believed in this war, in any war. My own father had been killed at twenty-six in the last war that had ravaged the world for thinking he was doing the right thing for his people and his country by joining up. As if endless bloodshed could solve the world's problems. "A war to end wars"? Little more than twenty years later madness had spread around the world again, on an even larger scale.

I toyed with the idea of desertion more than once, but I knew the odds of being caught were far too high to try anything.

In the end, I hadn't served even been serving for a year when a stray bullet ripped through the muscle above my right knee. It was early in 1945. They patched me up and promised I'd be back on the battlefield in a few weeks' time. I said nothing, secretly hoping the war would be over by then.

I didn't go back to the battlefields.

One day I woke up, as disoriented as I was after today's weird dream, dazed and sweaty, with a dry mouth and woozy head. The plump face of a young woman swam into focus. I heard her say, "He's coming to!" It took some time to realize she meant me.

I was feeling more tired than I had ever felt in my life. It was difficult to concentrate on anything in particular, scraps of thoughts were floating through my head incoherently. My right leg hurt all over, and I was feeling a little sick to my stomach. I blinked and slowly turned my head from side to side, taking in the white screens to both sides of my bed and the young woman's white uniform.

She smiled at me, somewhat anxiously.

Warily, I asked in a croaky voice, "What's the matter with my leg? It hurts like hell right down to the foot."

Her eyes widened slightly. She hastily murmured something about getting the doctor for me and hurried off.

The doctor told me everything in a matter-of-fact, but not unsympathetic tone. The painful but rather harmless injury I'd suffered had become infected – now I remembered that my leg had been swollen and tender and an angry red around the knee for several days – which eventually led to a life-threatening sepsis. The only way to save me, he was sorry to say, had been an amputation.

I raised my head a little, looking down at my leg or what was left of it. Had I still nursed a tiny glimmer of hope that the doctor was wrong, had confused me with another person, this was proof that it was true.

I lay back, covering my face with my hands, wishing I could sink back into merciful, forgetful unconsciousness.

The war was over for me, but so was my life, at thirty-one.

Unbidden images of war invalids I had come across around the world flashed through my mind, more often than not ragged, shabby figures in ill-fitting clothes hanging around bars in port areas, drunk most of the time.

I swore to myself at that moment I wouldn't end up like that – but what alternatives did I have?

One thing was clear, I couldn't go back to the island. No more pearl-diving. The mere idea made me feel even sicker. What the Commissioner had once accused me of was not true - I certainly had not been a god there, not at all - but I had felt at home. I had loved my work and the company of the natives, some of them had become friends. For the first time in my life I had been in the right place. Now I would probably have to return to the States, something I had never intended to do.

The next thought that struck me was even more shattering. Evelyn. I wanted to see her again, more than ever, yet it was strictly out of the question to let her see me like that. I hadn't had much to offer her before, but now I had nothing at all. I couldn't possibly impose myself on her. I didn't want to see shock or pity or even revulsion in her eyes. Better if we didn't meet again and her most recent memory of me remained that of the day she left the island. Our future had been decided. Meaning there would be no future for us.

Never before had I felt such helpless and hopeless despair. I had often felt strangely out of place in my life, frequently misunderstood and sometimes, especially as a youth, downright miserable, but never so utterly devastated. I was numb with shock, trembling.

When the doctor, who I hadn't even noticed leaving, came back to give me some sedative shot, I welcomed the darkness that encompassed me quickly, wishing I could stay there forever. Wishing I was dead.


	3. A stranger to myself

Another Springsteen song. "Streets of Philadelphia" was written in a totally different time and context, but the first few lines express Mick's feelings perfectly when he is faced with the challenge of a life utterly changed by his injury.

_I was bruised and battered  
>I couldn't tell what I felt<br>I was unrecognizable to myself  
>saw my reflection in a window and<br>didn't know my own face ..._

* * *

><p>I survived, though. Outwardly, the healing proceeded smoothly once the bacteria were out of my system, no further infection, no fever. The doctors were quite satisfied with the progress I made, but nobody seemed to care much about my feelings, my fears, my depression. The medical personnel were either briskly efficient or sickeningly cheery, with the exception of the young nurse who had been there when I came around after surgery. Amelia was the only one who seemed genuinely interested in more than just my condition, and she was the only one who knew about Evelyn. There was something about her that inspired confidence in me, and, having grown up with four brothers, she knew how to hit the right tone when she spoke to me and the other men.<p>

It was her who brought me books to read during the endless empty hours of the day, who kept visiting me after I had been transferred to the convalescent ward, and it was her who told me that a she had seen advertising for a lecture by a young researcher and writer called Evelyn Spence

So she was here. Or at least not far away.

I yearned to see her again, her flaming hair, her lovely fair-skinned face, her expressive eyes, her delicate body. Longed to hear her beloved voice and feel the touch of her hand.

Yet I bristled at the thought of encountering her face to face. A single look at me would make it brutally clear that the Mick Carpenter she had known no longer existed.

I considered writing to her but dismissed the idea quickly. I had no address to start with. Even if I found out where she lived, I was afraid she wouldn't answer or let me know in some friendly but unequivocal lines that she had found happiness with somebody else.

Then it crossed my mind to ask Amelia to attend Evelyn's lecture in town and give her the pearl.

She refused. In fact, she got angry with me. Very angry. "Carpenter, I would never have thought you'd be a coward!" she said in her blunt and straightforward way. "This is the woman you love, goddammit! She's here and you don't even want to try to see her? Send another woman instead? Are you nuts? If she loves you as you said she did, she won't dump you because you got your leg hacked off."

I knew she was right, but it hurt anyway. I simply couldn't help my feelings, my pride and my fears.

I had been out with some comrades a few times recently, just for a change of scene, and although it hadn't been bad to be out of the hospital surroundings for a while, I had been relieved to return in the evenings. I hated the way people seemed to view me only as an invalid. Everybody appeared to notice the leg that was gone, but no one bothered to see the man that was still there.

I had always been somewhat different from most of those around me. As a child I had always stood out because of my height and mass of black curls that I wore longer than most other boys. My classmates made fun of my peculiar eye colour, long lashes and my one slightly drooping eyelid, my "girlish" hair and interest in books and music; they picked on me for just about everything I did or said because I never joined in their silly games, consisting mainly of bullying and schoolyard brawls. Except for one or two occasions when they had attacked me bodily and I had fought back hard, surprising them (and earning some respect, too), I had simply hardened my outer shell of silence and reticence and decided that those kids were just a bunch of idiots. I didn't need their appreciation. I was happiest by myself and didn't care much about other people's opinions.

Now I hated children's curious stares and adults' quickly averted glances, hated the way young women first seemed to take in my face and build and then looked away regretfully when they became aware of the missing leg, hated the back-slapping camaraderie of the World War I veterans we met once in a café. Most of all I hated all the patriot hero crap like mothers telling their children to give up their seat on the bus for that man "who has fought bravely against our enemies". I hated all that for constantly reminding me of all I had lost, irretrievably.

I knew I would have to get used to those stares at some point, but I just couldn't see how.

Physical pain was something I could deal with relatively well. The pain in my leg could be punishing at times, but those phases passed and I could always get a painkiller if I couldn't stand it any more.

The pain in my soul wasn't soothed so easily. Often I woke up in the morning, feeling alright in my half-sleep, until consciousness kicked in and brought me down hard into reality. I had to face the fact again that I was irrevocably, and visibly, handicapped. There were too many things I would never do again, not even with somebody else's help. Sometimes I could hardly muster the strength to get out of bed. I didn't know what to get up for any longer.


	4. One rainy Sunday

I was listening to Grand Union's "Through the Green Fuse" album while thinking about some aspects of this story. The song "Fall Into My Arms" fits both Evelyn and Mick as they are lost and lonely and missing each other:

_You can never go home again  
>you can never rewind<br>just play till the end  
>and no one is your friend<br>so lonely_

_Won't you fall into my arms, my arms again  
>won't you fall into my, my arms again<em>

* * *

><p>Amelia's harsh reaction to my request kept me pondering my options for days, until I finally made up my mind to attend the lecture and decide what to do with the pearl once I was there. I would sit in the back of the room so that I could leave easily if I felt the need.<p>

On that cool, grey Sunday, Amelia helped me put on my uniform, holding a mirror in front of me when I had finished knotting my tie very carefully. "You're looking great", she said encouragingly.

I did not. The only thing the pale-faced man in the mirror with the haunted eyes and hollow cheeks had going for himself was being impeccably dressed, the dark but greying hair neatly parted. I didn't look like myself one bit. But I said nothing. Amelia hadn't known the old Mick after all.

The lecture took place at a rather dusty and bleak little hall. I chose a seat at the edge of the last row, close to the entrance, trying to remain undetected, hoping she would not look into my direction when she arrived.

She came in through a door on the other side of the room with an elderly gentleman, probably her agent, looking strangely grown-up in her grey skirt and jacket. Her hair was longer than I had ever seen it and pinned up at the back of her head. She was still beautiful, but in a more serious, mature way now, and I sat transfixed as she began to read. Her familiar voice rang out loud and clear through the crowded hall, making my heart beat faster, conjuring pictures of the place and the people we had both loved, speaking of the natives' traditions and beliefs, of her research work, of her husband the professor and of a pearl diver who had once taken her with him on his boat. Only she and I knew that it had really been her who had simply got on my boat and refused to leave. The thought made me smile a little through the regret that clenched my heart.

It was over far too fast. The elderly gentleman stepped forward, thanked the audience and announced that those who wished to were welcome to step forward and have their books autographed. I hesitated for a moment, waiting until a long queue had formed and the table where she sat was surrounded by people. Finally I got up and slowly advanced to the front of the room, beside the main queue. Some people politely offered me to slip in before them, but I declined, murmuring thanks, keeping my head down.

She was busy talking to an elderly couple, her head turned to the other side, away from me, and I quickly pushed the little envelope into the corner of the table and set off towards the exit uninhibited.

The train station was just around the corner. I arrived there shortly before heavy rain began to fall, sat down in the deserted waiting area and took a deep breath. My heart was still pounding, her firm and mellifluous reading voice echoing through my head. I wondered if what I'd done had been the right thing to do. Perhaps I shouldn't have come. I would only miss her worse than before, now that I had seen her.

I glanced at my watch. Five minutes until my train was due to arrive. Better go outside a little earlier, I thought, rising awkwardly from the low hard bench.

The rain was still pouring down in grey sheets, driven sideways by gusts of wind. I kept to the back of the covered platform for shelter, hoping the train would be on time. The weather had worsened the pain in my leg, and my shoulders were aching with tension. I was worn out physically and emotionally, feeling old and tired and miserable.

The train had been overdue for at least ten minutes when I heard the quick clatter of a woman's heels through the noise of the rain. I remained in my corner, hoping it was not someone of the chatty kind. I was even less inclined than usual to endure silly platform small talk about the weather.

I don't know what made me turn around after all when the sound of footsteps had stopped.

Evelyn.

She would notice me in a matter of seconds. I cursed the unreliable timetable inwardly. A situation like this, leaving me no possibility to resort to what I had usually done - running away or at least hiding - was exactly what I had wanted to avoid. I felt caught and trapped, and I was afraid of how she would react to seeing me in this state I was in.

Still I couldn't keep my eyes off her.

She stood rooted to the spot on the other side of the platform, her reading glasses still on, spattered with raindrops, the shoulders of her grey jacket as wet as her hair, looking around frantically.

Suddenly her eyes widened in disbelief and she brought one hand to her mouth in slow motion with the surprise of recognition and the shock of realizing that I was missing a leg.

The next thing I knew was her cool white hand on my cheek, her lovely face turned up towards mine, our eyes locked. There was true compassion in her steady gaze, not the condescending, pitying kind, but loving sympathy. An underlying sadness in her beautiful eyes, a little moist now, showed that she, too, must have suffered through hard times since we had parted.

None of us spoke a word. Eventually I put a hand on her shoulder, pulling her towards me. She leaned into me, a bit gingerly, and I bowed my head to kiss her gently on the top of her damp and slightly dishevelled hair, holding her slender figure against my side, closing my eyes, inhaling her familiar scent. A single tear trickled down my cheek. I was glad she didn't notice it.

An undefined mixture of conflicting emotions made me almost dizzy. I didn't know if this was the end or the beginning of something. I didn't even know what I wanted it to be.

But the train left without me that afternoon.


	5. For better, for worse

Forgive me for this Springsteen overdose, but I love the lyrics of this song. They capture wonderfully what loving someone, and being loved in return, is all about.

_We said we'd walk together, baby, come what may_  
><em>That come the twilight should we lose our way<em>  
><em>If as we're walkin' a hand should slip free<em>  
><em>I'll wait for you<em>  
><em>And should I fall behind<em>  
><em>Wait for me<em>

_We swore we'd travel, darlin', side by side_  
><em>We'd help each other stay in stride<em>  
><em>But each lover's steps fall so differently<em>  
><em>But I'll wait for you<em>  
><em>And if I should fall behind<em>  
><em>Wait for me<em>

_Now everyone dreams of a love lasting and true_  
><em>But you and I know what this world can do<em>  
><em>So let's make our steps clear that the other may see<em>  
><em>And I'll wait for you<em>  
><em>If I should fall behind<em>  
><em>Wait for me<em> 

* * *

><p>It was the thought of this embrace, the way she had done the right thing instinctively then, that had finally convinced me to stay with her despite my doubts, and this precious feeling of security, of belonging, of being at ease, being myself that she gave me. And continues to give.<p>

The room is lit by the day's first sunlight now. Evelyn has moved away from me in her sleep and is lying on her side. I refrain from touching her because I don't want to wake her just yet, but I study her carefully. Her wavy red-golden hair has fallen across her cheek, hiding her face. Apart from that, only her shoulder with the lacy strap of her nightie is visible above the covers. Those moments when I watch her in the early morning light are the one good thing about those sleepless nights I keep having.

Again I wonder what I would have done with my life without her. She has simply been there for me all the time, through the highs and especially the lows, enduring my brooding silence when depression washed over me and threatened to submerge me, my sarcasm when anger and frustration made me lash out at the person that meant more to me than anyone else ever had. I know that she often wept when she thought I wouldn't notice. In the beginning I tended to feel guilty for burdening her with my presence. I still hated what I had become and couldn't imagine that she would want to carry the burden of a crippled and traumatized man permanently, I thought she would one day regret her decision to take me in.

I have come to understand that she knew very well what she was doing. I should have known from the start that Evelyn Spence wouldn't do anything she didn't believe in. Eventually I learned to accept her love and care without second thoughts.

She has never failed to endorse and support me. Whenever I was about to surrender fatalistically if something didn't work out quickly enough – the search for a new occupation or the slow and painful process of learning to walk with an artificial leg as well as many of the everyday challenges I was facing again and again – she kept encouraging me to see things through.

Looking back, I have lost a lot since the war became an inevitable reality in my life. There are times when I miss the island and its people badly. I've never loved any job I've done more than the pearl trade, and the limits to my scope of activity can be frustrating even after such a long time.

But it's what I found that matters, something I had once thought was only for other people. The love of my life, my soulmate. We have built a wonderful home in those seven years and a wonderful relationship.

We haven't married because we never felt the need to. What we share doesn't require any official stamp, nor rings and vows and lavish ceremony.

I want to spend the rest of my life with Evelyn by my side, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health. I don't have to say the words aloud in a church or sign some paper for her to know that I will love and cherish her until my final day, whenever that may be.

And I know that she feels the same. The unconditional love of a woman ready to make sacrifices for me, to stand by me, to wait for me if I fell behind was a wholly new experience for me and the greatest gift I've ever received.

Evelyn is stirring beside me as she often does shortly before the alarm clock starts to ring. I don't want that jarring noise to tear her from her sleep this morning, so I reach over and turn the alarm off before it begins to sound.

When it's time for her to wake up, I roll over and softly whisper "Good morning", kissing the bit of her cheek that peeks out between her tousled curls.

She gives a sleepy little sigh, squeezing her eyelids tightly shut for a moment like a little girl. She hates having to get up early and can't help smiling because that was exactly what I had been expecting her to do.

Knowing all her little quirks so well gives me a warm and tender feeling of familiarity and intimacy.

The feeling of having found my place in the world at last.


End file.
